Every Power Awakening in Jujutsu Kaisen, Ranked

Jujutsu Kaisen has no lack of strong characters that often break the boundaries of reality itself. And a lot of those characters started off as weak and gradually grew stronger. However, ever so often, there comes a moment in their life that boosts their potential several-fold.

This moment can be really early in their story, with their first awakening immediately making them one of the strongest, or it can be much later, which is perfect for the underdog characters. Let’s rank all the awakenings that we’ve seen in the manga on the basis of how relevant they were.

TITLE	Jujutsu Kaisen
MAL RATING (as of June 20, 2026)	8.18 / 10
ORIGINAL CREATOR	Gege Akutami
PUBLISHING DATE	Mar 5, 2018 to Sep 30, 2024
WHERE TO READ	Viz Media

7 Dagon Becomes a Complete Special Grade

Before the Shibuya Incident, Dagon was a relatively weak cursed spirit who hadn’t taken birth properly. To be honest, he was quite cute as well, and one may not even look at him as a threat. However, after Gojo Satoru killed Hanami, Dagon awakened into his true form, now looking like a proper cursed spirit.

However, this awakening didn’t amount to much as he was practically unable to kill any single character. His luck ran out. While he was able to open a strong domain right after awakening, he was immediately targeted by Toji, who had taken over a sorcerer’s body. That, of course, did not end well for Dagon.

6 Megumi Manifests Chimera Shadow Garden

When Megumi encountered the finger bearer cursed spirit all alone, his first instinct was to just survive. However, during that battle, he remembered everything that Sukuna told him during their last interaction. According to Sukuna, Megumi was full of potential and was simply not living up to it. Furthermore, even Gojo Satoru told Megumi that he has the potential to one day rival him.

During that encounter, Megumi finally decided to give it his all and opened his half-complete domain. In this domain, he was able to defeat a special-grade cursed spirit all on his own, without even using some of his strongest shikigamis. However, the reason this awakening ranks this low is that it was his mindset change rather than suddenly actually getting stronger.

5 Higuruma’s Personal Trial

Higuruma was a defense lawyer who was pushed to his limits right before the Culling Games during a trial. It is unknown if he had already awakened his cursed technique because of Kenjaku’s Uzumaki, or if that was the first time he awakened it.

The point is, right after getting a broken cursed technique that can challenge the king of curses himself, he killed most of the people in that courtroom, and went on to join the Culling Games. This is one of the pure “awakenings” in this ranking, and the only reason it doesn’t rank higher is that we didn’t really get to see how everything played out.

4 Maki Unlocks Her True Potential

Maki and Mai were twins, which means, according to the rules of the Jujutsu world, both of their powers were limited. Maki was heavenly restricted, meaning she couldn’t use any cursed technique or even sense cursed energy. On the other hand, Mai had a cursed technique that had a lot of potential, but it couldn’t be achieved.

When Mai was killed by her own father, Maki became whole. She became equivalent to Toji himself and massacred her entire clan. The episode in which these events played out even became the highest-rated episode of this anime for a while.

3 Yuji Unlocks the Shrine Cursed Technique

Now we are deep into spoiler territory. After experiencing Sukuna using his body again and again, Yuji unlocked the same technique that Sukuna had: Shrine. He even surprised Sukuna with that during the final battle. Furthermore, we can see in Jujutsu Kaisen Modulo that he even perfected the technique better than Sukuna himself.

The only reason this is not ranked higher is that, rather than a sudden awakening, Yuji gradually got stronger. Initially, he was only able to cut weak things, as he wasn’t able to damage Sukuna properly either.

2 Sukuna Tames Mahoraga and Breaks the World

During the Shibuya Incident, Sukuna defeated Mahoraga with relative ease. However, the outcome for that was much more fruitful than he had hoped for. After he took over Megumi Fushiguro’s body, he got access to the Ten Shadows Technique, and that means he got complete control over Mahoraga himself.

While initially making him act as an outside support that was easily handled by Gojo Satoru, Sukuna eventually invented the World Cutting Slash that allowed him to bypass infinity, and put Gojo Satoru to rest. The reason this awakening ranks this higher is that Sukuna changed the course of the story just by this one act.

1 Gojo’s Awakening After Losing to Toji

When Gojo was a student himself, he had the misfortune of being targeted by Toji, who was in his prime back then. At this point, Gojo was still learning to use his cursed technique. After a long plan and the final attack with the Inverted Spear of Heaven, Toji struck Gojo.

Thinking he had won, Toji went after Geto and Amanai. However, even after being stabbed through the neck, Gojo didn’t give up and finally understood the Reverse Cursed Technique, which allowed him to cheat death. Using RCT, he was then also able to automate his cursed technique and become the strongest.

RANK	CHARACTER
7	Dagon
6	Megumi Fushiguro
5	Higuruma
4	Maki Zenin
3	Yuji Itadori
2	Ryomen Sukuna
1	Gojo Satoru

Which awakening moment was your favorite? Let us know in the comments.

Jujutsu Kaisen is streaming on Crunchyroll and available to read on VIZ Media.